This Friday 22 November at 1400 GMT, Turner Sims hosts The Britten Stream live webcast as part of the international celebrations to mark the 100th birthday of composer Benjamin Britten. The event will include the premiere of three new short films made by Southampton based film organisation City Eye reflecting the local associations with Britten and his music.

The Britten Stream – a Friday Afternoons project

As part of the centenary celebrations over 100,000 young people across the world will sing Benjamin Britten’s 'Friday Afternoons' songs. ‘Friday Afternoons’ is a set of 12 songs composed by Britten between 1933 and 1935. The simple songs, with witty piano accompaniments, are dedicated to Britten’s schoolmaster brother, Robert, and the boys of Clive House preparatory school, Prestatyn – a school in which choir practice and singing lessons regularly took place on a Friday afternoon.

At Turner Sims on Friday 300 children from schools across Hampshire, Portsmouth and Southampton will sing a selection of the songs from the cycle in a live webcast hosted by pianist and broadcaster David Owen Norris.

Please note: This event will only be streamed online - there will be no seating available in Turner Sims to watch this event live.

Aldeburgh Music’s mass-participation Friday Afternoons singing project started by involving schools in Suffolk (where Britten was born), was then taken up by groups in every region of the UK and has now spread to four continents across the world. There will be hundreds of events across the UK and the rest of the world with schools, choirs, academies and more all celebrating Britten's 100th birthday, Friday 22 November, by singing his set of songs Friday Afternoons. On Friday performances will start in Melbourne, Australia at 03:00 GMT and run through to 22:00 GMT in Santa Monica, California, USA. Throughout the day the Friday Afternoons website will showcase activity, with live streams from a selection of events (including Turner Sims) and with footage uploaded from locations around the world, ranging from classrooms to concert halls and even the old school building in Prestatyn, now a care home, for which the songs were originally written.

The Britten Stream is a project devised and led by Turner Sims with its Music Hub partners in Hampshire, Portsmouth and Southampton. The project is supported with funding in kind from partners and with a grant from Aldeburgh Music and Arts Council England.